


Passing the baton

by rivalpoet2



Category: Good Wife (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-04
Updated: 2012-11-04
Packaged: 2017-11-17 23:02:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/554167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rivalpoet2/pseuds/rivalpoet2
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alicia catches a long-overdue clue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Passing the baton

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers up till Season 4, episode 5, "Waiting for the Knock."

“Hey, Alicia.” Cary sidles up to Alicia standing by the bar; it’s her turn to buy drinks. It’s Friday night, and the fourth-year associates are out, a weekly ritual that Alicia has managed to be a part of ever since the separation from Peter. Drinks on a weeknight, free to stay out as late as she likes, no kids to go home to: Alicia never thought she would, in her mid-forties, have the liberating schedule of a college student once again. 

“Cary, you’re late.” Alicia tries once more to flag the bartender’s attention. “We’re on the second round of drinks already.” 

“Yeah, I know.” His reply is absent-minded, perfunctory. 

“Anything wrong?” The bartender is hovering over a giggling, slightly-tipsy brunette. Alicia sighs; she doubts any of them will see a third round of drinks, at this rate. 

“I’m not sure.” 

Alicia snaps to attention. “Did something come up with Lemond Bishop? Or his son? Did the FBI….”

“No, no, it’s not Bishop,” Cary assures her; makes his own half-hearted attempt to wave down the bartender, just as ineffectually. “I was talking to Kalinda. That’s why I’m late.” He pauses. “She wouldn’t come out for drinks.” 

“Oh.” Alicia remembers now. Cary and his schoolboy crush; Kalinda always did have that effect on people. She remembers another schoolboy – Zach, and his repeated visits to the bathroom during the Wright Carter appeal, his head turned and mouth agape, all stammering questions and awkward pauses – and feels slightly sorry for Cary, even as she suppresses an eye-roll. He doesn’t stand a chance, she thinks wryly. _None of us do_ , is her knee-jerk follow-up, which she quickly ignores by turning maternal: “Listen, Cary, she’s probably just tired. She did literally have to sniff out a corpse last weekend, and the case has been keeping us all on our feet all week…” 

Cary doesn’t respond; Alicia senses that he’s only half-paying attention to her. She tries futilely for the bartender one more time. 

“Alicia. What do you think about our tow-truck client?” Alicia’s hand freezes, mid-wave. 

“What about him?” She’s practiced at this neutrality, gives nothing away. She’s good at answering questions with questions, she’s been told.

Cary hesitates. “I get the feeling that he and Kalinda know each other.” 

“How do you mean?” 

“I’m not sure.” He’s shifting from foot to foot, fingers tapping restlessly against the bar counter, eyes suddenly sharp and focused on her. “I tried to ask her, but she said she’s never met him before.” 

“There you go then,” Alicia shrugs. Cary looks unsatisfied, slightly suspicious. “Cary,” Alicia sighs. “You know Kalinda’s … private.” The word sticks in her throat: too much history there. Alicia remembers herself more than two years ago, just as tipsy and just as giggly as this bartender’s brunette; remembers what she’d asked Kalinda and why she’d asked her; remembers the temptations of one night of no repercussions, if only she’d managed to decode Kalinda’s privacies. Alicia thinks back to last weekend at Bishop’s: Kalinda and Lana Delaney seemed to be on good terms again, she’d noticed. She tries not to wonder how flexible Kalinda’s become. 

“I know. It’s just that….” Cary is unusually halting. Alicia wants to change the subject, is growing angry and sick of it all. Kalinda’s affairs were a morass – Peter, Lana, Nick, Cary, the dog-trainer who’d been a little _too_ helpful, and god only knew who else Kalinda was entangled with. Alicia had gotten the memo a long time ago: Kalinda does that and does it frequently. No guilt, no commitments, from one-night stands to an abandoned marriage – all of them just casualties of love. But she, thinks Alicia bitterly, might be the only casualty whom Kalinda never actually did fuck. 

“Cary,” Alicia begins tiredly, “I think we should respect…”

“I saw them fighting,” he interrupts. He’s decided to speak now and the words come fast. “Last weekend, when you were at Bishop’s, the tow-truck guy came in and wanted to see Kalinda. After that, I saw them fighting. And I don’t mean verbally. He grabbed her, Alicia.” Cary’s brow is furrowed. “He grabbed her – hard – and she shoved him. He seemed kinda….” Cary stops. “Violent,” he finishes, lamely. 

Alicia doesn’t expect this. She’d expected lovesickness, adolescent jealousy, boyish competitiveness. She’s misdiagnosed the problem, she realizes: Cary is worried. Not for the first time, it strikes her forcefully how much Cary has grown up. She thinks of his laugh outside the Lockhart-Gardner elevators when she’d told him she didn’t get it, why he’d defended her against the accusation of forgery. “How things change,” he’d said then; and she’d been ashamed. How things change, indeed. Kalinda had told her that Nick was dangerous before. And Kalinda had told Cary nothing. Yet here they were, Cary telling her that Nick was dangerous. She’d forgotten; or rather, had wondered how dangerous a man who dressed in torn jeans, spoke in a Cockney accent, and downed two glasses of San Pellegrino in a row could be. Another Kalinda affair gone wrong, she’d decided. Best not to pursue it, best to leave it alone, best not to ruffle the fragile entente they’d both established that avoided all talk of sex, love, Peter, flexibility. Cary had shamed her once again. 

“Alicia?” Cary waits for her response. Alicia feels as if she’s going to be sick, wants to get out of the bar, wants to find Kalinda now. Cary’s worry presses against her like a physical weight. She doesn’t know what to tell him without violating Kalinda’s confidence, but can’t bring herself to do what she’s done for the past four weeks by dismissing his concerns. “You know something…,” he says slowly, when she doesn’t speak and doesn’t meet his gaze. 

“Cary,” she trails off. She can’t tell him, not without Kalinda’s permission. So she does the next best thing. “Cary,” she repeats. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.” Alicia looks up this time and faces him squarely; faces herself too. “I’ll take care of her,” she promises. 

Cary studies her, stays silent for a while. He knows who Kalinda had chosen a long time ago, knows who she’d always championed and who she’d choose to champion her now. He knows it’s not him. “OK,” he says finally. “Shall we try and get drinks?” he asks, graceful in his capitulation. 

“Actually, would you mind getting this round?” Alicia asks. “I think I should go.” 

He nods, unsurprised. “I’ll do that.” He holds her gaze warmly, one runner passing on a baton to another. He smiles at her and Alicia is reminded of how good-looking he is, how effortlessly charming, and wonders, not for the first time, why Kalinda had helped her instead of him during that first-year competition. Cary never seemed to bear a grudge about that. “You’re a good friend,” she tells him, before turning to leave. 

Outside in her car, Alicia takes her phone out and takes a deep breath. She dials Kalinda’s number, waits for her to answer.


End file.
